Black Friday

Why anyone would go shopping today is a complete mystery to me. I think I might rather shoot myself in the head.

Yet that's what people do the day after Thanksgiving. Perhaps it's because of the sales. Perhaps it's because of the cheesy give-aways. (At the King of Prussia mall, for example, the first 1000 shoppers of the day received a free shopping "survival kit" including bottled water, Starbucks gift certificates, and massage coupons for soothing away the shopping-induced stress.) But really I'd like to give people more, or perhaps, less credit than that.

I think people go shopping today, even though they know they will have to endure hell on earth, because they want to be part of something, this ridiculous phenomenon of greed and consumerism that manifests itself on the first day of the Christmas season. It sounds bizarre, but can't you picture it? That battered person returned from the front lines (i.e. the mall), bearing his or her purchases like a badge of honor. "I made it in," her or she will say, "and I made it out alive. And my new 42" plasma TV was only $799!"

Of course he or she had to trample three small children and an elderly woman to grab one of those babies before Walmart ran out, but that's just part of the fun. It's hysteria, chaos, anarchy sanctified by the corporate gods. How can you resist throwing yourself into the melee?

Now, don't get me wrong. I love to shop as much as the next guy or gal, but the conditions under which the shopping is to be done must be orderly and serene for me to extract any enjoyment from the experience. I prefer to shop at about 10:30 a.m. on a Tuesday morning, when the stores are almost empty and the merchandise is pristine and untouched. Why anyone would subject themselves to the torture that is Black Friday... well, I've already claimed not to be able to understand it.

The only thing I really want to buy today is bananas. But part of me fears even entering a grocery store. Maybe I'll go late this afternoon or evening, once the mobs have crawled back to their cars and gone home to collapse in front of their new TVs and their leftovers. I'll quietly pay for my bananas but I'll still feel ashamed for having spent money in a commercial establishment on this blackest of days. Maybe I'll just wait 'till tomorrow...